A Day in 'The Holy City'

Purim was Yesterday! As an assignment we had to attend a Purim service at Synagogue, it was quite interesting! Purim celebrates the deliverance of Jews in Persia from Haman and the others who sought their demise. During the service, they read through the book of Esther and sing some songs. Here is a report I wrote for it, and a couple videos I took of the service. On Purim, people dress up, adults just as much as kids! It's also known as a holiday for getting drunk...we passed quite the dance party on our way home from Synagogue!

Purim Service

            The Purim service at Kehilat Kol Haneshama was very different than the Qabbalat Shabbat service. Because Purim was on a Thursday night, not Shabbat, there were many people using electronics, including one man who’s task was to photograph the event, and capture the costumes of individuals at the service. In addition, the Synagogue was brightly decorated with colorful balloons, fireworks burst outside, gift bags were handed out, and at the door was a basket of noisemakers for participants like myself, who did not bring one. Most the congregation, however, had brought their own noise makers, varying from the classic wooden type, to a baby rattle, or a rubber chicken with a squeaker.

While the Qabbalat service to welcome the Sabbath also was technically a celebration, the Purim service was much less reverent, and much more jovial. The reading was interrupted often, either by a shout from the audience such as “Go Vashti!” or to guess what the costume of the last reader was supposed to be. Not to mention, of course, the regular interruptions at the name of Haman.

The book of Esther was read, or more accurately, was sung by several individuals of the congregation, more often women than men. In addition, there was no division of men and women’s seating. Although this may simply have been because it was not Shabbat, my assumption is that the congregation is less conservative than the Synagogue we visited for Shabbat. This is based also on the fact that many of the women were dressed with bare shoulders or knees, and several of the men did not wear a kippah or head covering. The Synagogue’s website calls themselves a “center of progressive Judaism.”

            Rabi Levi Wyman-Kelman, an immigrant from the United States, founded the Synagogue, and it is clear that most the congregation were native English speakers. Although the service was held in Hebrew, at least half of the conversations around us were in English. At one point, for example, a man from the audience called to the director of the service who was dressed as captain Kirk, “Beam me up, Scotty!” To which he replied good naturedly, “There’s no intelligent life down here!” before resuming the service in Hebrew.

            Aside from the readers and the director, who called the readers up and led several songs, there was also a chorus of several woman and men who periodically interjected some simple verses between readings. The reading was, unlike the Friday night service, quite theatrical, with many dramatized voices for king Ahasuerus, Haman, and especially the line by Haman’s wife. At one point, which I think was when the King is having the royal chronicles read to him at night, the text was sung to the tune of “rockabye baby.”

            The Purim service was a vibrant community celebration, less formal than a typical Synagogue service, yet still religious in remembering the plight of the Jews in Persia, and their deliverance from the hand of Haman.